


Duty

by ziskandra



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Gen, Redemption Equals Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:55:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24858742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ziskandra/pseuds/ziskandra
Summary: He receives mercy from the depths of a poisoned chalice.There are many times in Loghain's life where he could've died.Somehow, he survives.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 13
Collections: Fandom 5K 2020





	1. Act I

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inquisitor_tohru](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inquisitor_tohru/gifts).



**ACT I.**

Sometimes when they don’t think he’s paying attention, Loghain notices the other outlaws approach his father to ask him about his son.

That is their first mistake. Loghain is always watching. The Orlesians had wanted him to watch when they had murdered his mother, and he has been watching ever since. Hypervigilant, some might say, and to those who sought to critique him, Loghain would call them lucky. If he was a more religious man, perhaps he would have bid the Maker watch over them, so that they would not suffer as his mother had.

Loghain has little faith in the Maker, so he helps watch over his father’s group of ragtag outcasts instead. The Maker had abandoned his people, or so Sister Ailis had said, but Loghain would not.

He could not.

That’s why when people come to bother his father with their ridiculous questions, Loghain doesn’t seek to stop them. Their validation has little value to him, and his father is more than capable of deflecting unwanted attention.

Besides, the questions are always the same. They want to know if Loghain has always been this way, and his father always answers yes because Loghain is every inch his father’s son. They share everything from their taciturn natures to their disapproving features, from the anger that still boils in the bellies to their dream of a free Ferelden.

It scares them, Loghain thinks, to see a man so young driven with such purpose, but it suits him just fine. Let them be scared. Fear could keep a person safe when nothing else could protect him.

If he stops to think about it, he’d acknowledge it’s fear that has gotten them this far. It’s an uncomfortable realization so he does his best to not stop. To not think. If he keeps fighting, he will live to see another day.

Or die trying.

*

He hates Maric, the first few days they spend alone together in each other’s company, hates that his father has given his life for this incompetent fool. It matters not to Loghain that this boy beside him comes from the bloodline of Calenhad the Great himself; perhaps Maric’s mother had been a leader worth following, should the stories of the Rebel Queen hold true, but he does not understand what it is about royalty that inspires such frothing devotion.

It had mattered, clearly, to his father, but Loghain cannot claim to comprehend his father’s dying wish. Oh, he understands it at face-value: return the heir to his throne, secure the future of the Ferelden nation.

But he is too young to remember a ruler who wasn’t a tyrant, has no frame of reference for a monarch who even pretended to spare a care for his people. Why does it matter who opposed the usurper as long as somebody does? Hadn’t that been what his father and the outlaws had been doing, thumbing their noses at the occupying Orlesian forces and maintaining their lifestyles, their traditions? They had been no organized force, they no longer had their farms, their freeholds, but they had their freedom.

Isn’t that what it means to be Fereldan?

To be Fereldan is to be _free_.

*

It is during his time with the rebel army that Loghain finally begins to understand what his father had failed to impart upon him before his death. Perhaps the outlaws had their freedom, but they could have never united behind a single cause with such single-mindedness as the forces he now helps command.

He sees the old men weeping in their camp with a certainty Loghain cannot empathise with but rather envies; they remember the old days, the better days, their rightful king returned to them gives them hope that those times might return once more, regardless of Maric’s fitness to rule, regardless of anything else.

Despite Loghain’s doubts regarding the other man when they had first met, he can’t say that Maric’s not taking his responsibilities seriously. He may not have had Loghain’s upbringing, but the rebel prince is determined to see his mother’s dying wishes through, just as Loghain is honour-bound to respect his own father’s. It is, after all, Gareth’s final words that had kept Loghain by Maric’s side in those perilous early days, but it is no longer just his father’s dying wishes that keep him in the rebel camp.

The simple truth of the matter is that this is where he is needed. This is where he can make a difference. Sometimes, he yearns for a simpler life, a life where he is not drawn into meetings that go over his head; he is a strategist on a battlefield but he was never made for a life of delicate political negotiations, can hardly keep track of who is related to whom, whose loyalties are turning, but that is not his role, it is unnecessary. He can focus on what he is good at.

It is strange to be accepted into Arl Rendorn’s trusted circle of associates when the older man had once considered him expendable, but it’s not as though Loghain doesn’t understand. He’d do the same thing in the arl’s position.

He is just one man, and he is nothing compared to the rightful king.

He doesn’t want to be jealous of Maric, knows there is nothing to envy but the burden of a country’s fate on his shoulders, of a birthright so distant from Loghain’s common roots, but there are times when he cannot help it, although he does his damnedest to keep his feelings to himself.

It is during his time in the rebel army that he falls in love for the first time, but he would be a fool to not admit he knew it was doomed from the very beginning. He had seen and heard men getting silly over women before, and he is determined to not let his infatuation with Rowan interfere with his duty.

She is not his, would never be, was slated for better men and positions than he, and if he believed that Maric did not deserve the affections of such a woman he kept those thoughts to himself as well.

Loghain knows his place. Loghain knows where he belongs.

Oh, for the first time in his life, he feels like he actually belongs.

*

Something had broken inside Maric when he had driven his blade through his elven lover’s chest, and Loghain feels it shift inside him too. Instead of shattering, however, it hardens, solidifies.

There is a moment, brief and fleeting, where he wonders if he had made the right decision in guiding Maric’s hand, in leading him to believe the enormity of Katriel’s betrayal was unforgivable, in omitting the fact that she had changed her loyalty.

The moment passes, and Loghain steels his resolve. There is no time for second-guesses, for regrets. If he is to pass judgement on others based on only a cursory glance, a brief glimpse of their decisions at any one moment, then he is open to the prospect that others, too, will judge him for his misdeeds.

The opinions of others had mattered little to him before, but now… now, the stakes are higher. He is no longer focused on his own survival, on that of a small band of fellows, but an entire nation. And not only the people who currently live within its borders, but its legacy.

Ferelden would be free within his lifetime and when it was its people would never bend the knee to foreigners again.

It is too late to look back. There is only forward.

The only forgiveness he needs is Maric’s.

And he will never be a religious man, but he finds solace in the thought that the only judgement he will accept is that of the Maker himself.

He will do what he must for the future of Ferelden.


	2. Act II

**ACT II.**

Maric blames himself for his wife’s death, and Loghain cannot help but wonder if it’s because it’s easier than accepting he had no control over it at all. It has been so long since Teyrn Loghain has been in the depths of the royal palace; it is no secret that Ferelden’s general avoids the place when both the King and his wife had been present.

Now, however, Rowan is dead, and Loghain finds himself sitting on the end of his best friend’s marital bed. Although the room is immaculate, the dense fog of tension that settles over them both is thicker than any dust. Maric paces at first, up and down and over the flagstones, before he seats himself beside Loghain on the bed’s thick blankets. Their shoulders touch; the weight is more comforting than Loghain would care to admit. They are silent for several long minutes; unusual for the King, so often lively and animated in his personal life, but far more familiar ground for Loghain. He is content to sit here until his friend, his King, is ready to speak to him. Ready to tell him what he needs him to do.

Loghain makes no offers and no suggestions; for all that he is a strategist on the battlefield he knows not the best way to deal with grief. He can be a patient man, could wait for Maric for days, months, _years_ if necessary.

Fortunately, he doesn’t have to wait so long. Maric begins to weep through clenched teeth, an awful, heart-wrenching sound, the expression on his face clear he regrets showing this emotion in front of Loghain. Loghain cannot help but find it strange, because they have cried openly in front of one another at several points during the rebellion, and even though he spends the better part of the year in Denerim, he wonders when his friend had started to become a stranger.

Still uncertain of what consolation or solace his words can bring, he simply holds the other man in his arms and the King clutches to him gratefully, as though he’s the last solid thing in all of Thedas. Loghain doesn’t know how long they sit together like this in silent grief, his own eyes welling with tears that somehow manage to not yet spill. When Maric wipes at his eyes with one final whimper and asks him why he did what he had, when he had loved her too, Loghain loses his battle. With wet cheeks, his answer is directed more to the ornately detailed ceiling than to his friend. “I did what I had to do for the good of Ferelden.” It may be an answer Maric is used to hearing, but it does not make it any less true. Loghain had loved Rowan, once upon a time, but he has his own life now, a wife and a daughter for whom he would do anything, just as he would do whatever Maric commanded.

Rowan, on the other hand, had never seen him the same way after what had happened with Katriel. Loghain knew how some of the nobles tittered in their hushed whispers of a secret, scandalous love affair, but the truth of the matter was that Maric’s wife would never have been capable of loving him back, not anymore. The stolen glances across the court hall, across dining room banquets, had been Rowan’s own way of mourning the man she’d believed him to be, and his inconvenient presence at official functions had simply reminded her that she had been wrong about him, a memento of her folly.

Maric and Rowan had been a good match; they could trust and support each other in a way that Loghain would’ve found impossible. Whenever he spends time at the royal court, he cannot help but feel like he was being loosed into a den of starving blighted wolves, finds himself dreading the day that his daughter starts to show more interest in politics than she has already. He wants to spare her from this life, but it is impossible. For the better or the worse, Anora is the daughter of one of the most powerful men in Ferelden.

Loghain regrets nothing about the choices he has made, although some days he wonders how different his life would have been if he had not been the one to stumble upon Maric in the forest that day. He never allows himself to dwell upon it for long, however.

It was almost fifteen years ago.

Maric laughs, the sound forced and yet still mirthful. Not for the first time, Loghain finds himself wishing for some of the King’s natural charisma. “What about yourself?” Maric asks. The question causes Loghain to arch an eyebrow.

“Myself?” he asks, folding his hands neatly upon his knees as he leans forward and gives serious consideration to what he, a person, a man wants for the first time in many years. Even when he stops to think about it, he cannot think of any other answer to give. “I have been blessed with a beautiful, intelligent wife and a healthy daughter. There is nothing more I could ask for.” Perhaps apart from the events that had shaped their lives to have never happened at all, but they can’t simply wish away the Orlesian occupation.

Cannot forget ( _cannot forgive_ ) the murder of their mothers.

Another laugh emanates from Maric, this time more genuinely amused. “That's always your answer,” he says, half-complaint, half-teasing.

“I’m standing by it,” Loghain answers pithily. Some of the tension has lifted, and it almost feels like the old days of the rebellion, of trading barbs with his friend, of being constantly on the move, trudging always onwards in the hopes of gathering more support for their cause.

Maker, he had missed his friend. Although he is certainly grateful to the King, who had matured into a fine and reliable leader over the years after a rocky beginning, they had been different men once upon a time. One thing hasn’t changed, however: Loghain is a soldier, and he will never find comfort in the stillness his life has accorded to him these five years. What is a soldier, a general, with nothing to fight against?

“Surely I could have done more for you,” Maric murmurs, the breath of the almost apology warm against Loghain’s skin.

Loghain shakes his head. “All I require of you is that you continue to be the monarch Ferelden deserves.” It is not a lie, Loghain reasons, if it is the stronger of two competing truths.

If there’s a flash of hurt in Maric’s eyes, Loghain pretends to not see it.

He does not know how much longer they spend in Maric’s bedchambers, discussing the old days, before deciding to head outside to release Rowan’s ashes, but what he does know is that they will never speak of this matter again.

*

There is a rage bubbling up in Loghain that he has not felt since the rebellion. How could everyone give up on their King, on _Maric_ , so easily? Had they forgotten so soon how instrumental he had been to the rebellion? That the Ferelden nation as it stands today would have been lost without him? He could handle the critique of the banns, had never cared much for their opinions, but when Anora, his own daughter, had suggested that he perhaps should stop throwing so much of the country’s dwindling coffers after this fool’s crusade, his anger finally boils over.

They are at his estate in Denerim, in the study, when Anora provides him with her counsel and before he can even think he is jumping to his feet with a snarl, a gauntleted fist slamming into the hard wood oak of his desk. Quills rattle, parchment shakes, and the inkpot spills over onto one of his favourite maps, but Anora does not flinch. If anything, her gaze only hardens as she stares back at him with steely blue eyes. His own eyes.

Many people believe that Anora is every inch her father’s daughter, but they would be wrong. Loghain knows better.

Anora takes after her mother.

“If you will act like a child,” she starts coldly, “I will return once you have calmed yourself.” Shame flushes through his veins at the scolding, so reminiscent of the way he’d felt when Celia had dragged him out of the tent he’d pitched in Gwaren during the early days and instructed him to make something of the teyrnir.

He forces himself to breathe, sits back down with a heavy slump. “No. It’s quite all right.” There’s a brief pause before he continues, saying the words he knows Anora will not leave without hearing. “You’re right.”

Anora smiles. “I know.” Loghain expects her to depart immediately, but there’s something else on her mind, her expression softening as she takes a step towards him, gently placing a hand on his forearm across the table. “I’m sorry.”

‘Sorry’ doesn’t begin to salve the wound that Maric’s disappearance has inflicted upon him, but it will have to suffice. He can tell that Anora means it, and she _is_ right. They simply cannot afford to continue looking for the lost King at this time.

It is with a heavy heart that he recalls the search party, and it is soon thereafter he begins to have his nightmares again. His sleep had been calmer for the last few decades, since the rebellion, but now they come to him at night, when is vulnerable and alone in the Fade, the faces of his mother. His father. Rowan. Maric.

All the people he couldn’t save.

What was he worth as a man if he could not even protect the ones he loved?

A few weeks later, Anora’s final maneuver becomes clear. It seems that she had not remained idle after their discussion. In his hands he holds a letter from his wife. _Come home_ , the final sentence implores, and Loghain is no fool.

He complies.

*

Previously where there had been anger, there is now nothing. He feels like a hollowed-out shell of a man, looking upon the scene of his wife’s final resting place, her ashes scattered, feeling nothing. Again, he had failed to protect the ones he loved, the number of people he truly cared about in this world dwindling by the year. Anora and her husband stand by his side, and Loghain can’t help but wish his son-in-law weren’t here, an unwelcome interloper to their grief. Oh, he’s _family_ , and not only by marriage. Cailan is the son of Loghain’s best friend, the son of another woman he had once loved. But yet, Cailan had never known Celia, not truly. Cailan was the King, and Celia rarely left the teyrnir. Loghain might be the Teyrn, but everyone knew who truly wielded the power in Gwaren: the Teyrna.

The dynamic was no different from Anora and Cailan’s relationship, truly, and perhaps at another time, the thought would have amused him.

As usual, Anora is the first to break the silence. “You made her last years her happiest yet,” she starts, always choosing her words carefully. “She always spoke of you with high regard in her letters.” Cailan nods along in easy agreement, seemingly with nothing more to add.

His daughter always knows the right words to say. The reassurance brings some warmth back to his fingertips, but he cannot help but think he should have been there for Celia more often, not spent so much time away in the capital as he had. He had done his best to live a life with as few regrets as possible, but he could have been a better husband. A better father. Now his wife his dead and his daughter no longer needs him. Despite this, he knows he would fight the Maker himself to protect his daughter, his Queen.

He will do what he must for the future of Ferelden. 


	3. Act III

He is no stranger to the whispers of the court, but they have taken a different tune of late: some are sympathetic, some call him mad, some simply wonder how he can sleep at night.

The simple answer to that question is he _doesn’t_. His exhaustion weighs down upon him, heavier than his armor. He yearns for simpler days, the uneasy peace that had settled over the country after Maric had reclaimed his throne or even the days of fighting in the rebellion would have been preferable to this, to witness his country descend into a civil war he cannot stop, tearing itself apart from the inside out with little regard for the real threats, the invading forces. Darkspawn or Orlesian, neither are welcome here, and either group could well take advantage of the ground gained by the other. More and more Fereldan blood is shed every day in the countryside, and yet these Wardens still seek to divide his nation?

Not only are they surrounded by enemies, the enemies are already _here_ , within their borders, in their cities, in their homes. How in the Void is he meant to _sleep_? Everything he has worked so hard to protect teeters dangerously on the co-operation of his countrymen, and yet they fail to comply.

He wishes Maric was still here. Maker, he almost wishes _Cailan_ was still here. The boy may have been an idiot, but he was still young. He might have grown into a fine ruler yet. Yes, Loghain and Maric had been younger during the rebellion, even when they had fought at River Dane, but Loghain had experienced first-hand how the events that had transpired after the Rebel Queen’s death had shaped Maric into the man who he had become. Wasn’t that why they had battled so valiantly for the freedom of their country? So that their children would not have to live through the same atrocities they had?

And now, Cailan too was dead. Maric and Rowan’s son. He should have tried harder, tried to impose on him the foolishness of his actions, but when Cailan had insisted, as was his right, as the King, what was Loghain meant to do?

He’d had to act in the best interest of the country, could not send his soldiers to a pointless death. Cailan was doomed from the moment the horde had turned out to be larger than anyone had expected.

It had been a losing battle.

Perhaps Cailan, with his natural Theirin charms, could have united the nation, perhaps Cailan…

Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

When had he started to dwell on his mistakes, when had he begun to consider them mistakes at all?

In his fitful attempt at sleep that night, he is visited by his son-in-law, smiling at first but then there is blood everywhere, the point of a sword protruding through the lad’s ribcage.

He may not know the exact details of how Cailan met his end on that battlefield, but the symbolism is not lost on Loghain.

*

Alistair rages. Loghain gets the distinct impression that Maric’s bastard would run him through with a sword given half the chance, and at this moment in time, Loghain would not stop the lad.

He has lost.

It is over.

For so long he had regarded himself as Ferelden’s caretaker, but it is clear his country no longer needs him. It is as he always suspected it: the strength of the nation is in its people, and he is no longer the best man to unite it. No longer the man they have chosen.

If there is one part of this whole sordid affair that he does not regret, it is that he is proud of the woman his daughter has become.

Even if she must marry Maric’s other son, Anora will handle the situation with grace. For the good of Ferelden. It occurs to him now, with that foggy clarity that so often follows a battle, that everyone in this room wants what is best for Ferelden. They simply have different definitions, different methods, different outcomes… But at the end of the day, they are still all Fereldan, and that is what matters most. If he is to die here on this day, then he can be satisfied that he made the best choices he could have done with the information at hand at the time. Ferelden can now unite to confront the Blight, and Loghain must be satisfied with that.

He closes his eyes, as though expecting a swinging blow.

Instead, he receives mercy from the depths of a poisoned chalice.

Of course.

Death would be too easy.

*

It’s been strange, travelling on the road again after so many years spent only travelling back-and-forth between Denerim and Gwaren. It makes him feel like a younger man, and perhaps it should. He has been given a new lease at life, a second chance he had not expected, not deserved. Little time remains before Ferelden’s amassed armies meet the horde and the Archdemon in combat; Loghain can feel it in his blood. His tainted blood.

Loghain barely notices the witch waiting outside Mahariel’s quarters. The battle will be waged soon, and Loghain had seen the way the two had looked at each other. He certainly cannot begrudge his Commander one more night of stolen peace. None of them knew what the morrow would bring.

He's certainly not expecting to be brought into whatever discussion the other Warden and Morrigan are having, but nothing has been going the way he’d anticipated of late. Why not this as well? Mahariel’s brow is creased as he explains the predicament they find themselves in, that maybe nobody needs to die in the slaying of the Archdemon after all. Morrigan, of course, had come up with a solution. It just required a little droplet of blood magic. Sex magic. Honestly, Loghain finds the whole concept distasteful; he has a healthy distrust of mages, of blood mages in particular. Nothing good could come from old forbidden magics. He’s as sure of that as he was the day he and Maric had been brought to the old witch’s hut in the woods, the way she had controlled the trees and the environment around her in a way Loghain had never seen before, nor since. He still didn’t know what the wizened old woman had discussed with Maric in private that day, but her words to him about Loghain still rung in his ears, louder now since everything that had happened: _keep him close and he will betray you, each time worse than the last_.

Nonetheless, the old witch had been instrumental in getting them out of the wilds alive. Perhaps there is some merit to the eventual success of Morrigan’s plan, if not the morality. Doesn’t the Warden realise by now that Loghain cares not if he lives or dies? Better to die, he thinks, in service of his country, than to live this hollowed-out shell of a life. He has been a dead man walking for a long time now, dying slowly bit-by-bit over the years.

It would be nice to finally have some peace. True peace.

When Mahariel turns to him with those big great baleful eyes and asks him what he thinks, Loghain isn’t sure what sort of answer his commander is expecting. Somebody will have to die, and it might as well be Loghain. His mouth curls in dissatisfied amusement. “If you command it,” he tells the elf, “then I will do it.” Even if he doesn’t see the _point_ in the witch’s ritual.

The next moments hang in the air between them, until Mahariel comes to his conclusion. Shakes his head. Insists that neither of them will be going through with this.

Morrigan is obviously enraged, which just makes the whole matter more suspicious to Loghain.

It doesn’t matter. The archdemon will come, and Loghain will finally await the Maker’s judgement.

*

There is one last surprise awaiting him when they approach the city gates. Mahariel leaves him behind. The decision stuns Loghain, because he simply cannot understand it. What else could he have been brought here for, recruited for, if not this possibility of laying the final blow for the archdemon? It is the logical solution. He gapes, but his commander only looks at him with those beguiling eyes of his. Orders him to live. Tells him that one day, he’ll understand.

Mahariel is wrong. Loghain will _never_ understand, so long as he lives.

His life feels so unbearably long these days.

*

Mahariel dies. Loghain lives. And oh, Maker, he is sent to _Orlais_.

Even he cannot delude himself into believing this is for the good of his country.

But maybe that no longer matters.


	4. Act IV

Loghain doesn’t burst immediately into flames when first steps foot into the Orlesian Empire, and that’s as good a start as any. The alternative almost doesn’t sound too bad, but only almost. Ever since the Hero of Ferelden had died while laying the killing blow on the Archdemon, Loghain is determined not waste this opportunity he has been given, a chance to make something of an amends for the crimes he has committed, to still do some good in this world. There are many people in Thedas, in Ferelden, who would never forgive him, but he accepts that.

Some things simply could not be forgiven. Loghain had made his choices, and now he has to live with them. Live, where so many others had died.

He’s good with a sword and has years of combat experience behind him, which makes him as good a Warden candidate as any. Better than many, if one were looking at the matter from a purely tactical perspective, regarding the Wardens solely through their military life.

But Warden life is not like that. It's different from anything he had ever experienced, yet familiarly comforting all the same.

It reminds him of being back in the camp. Not the rebel camp, but his father’s camp, the little community of outlaws they had built together all focused on the one goal: survival.

Here, he is an outcast too, not for the things he might do, but the things he had done. That sits just fine with him. Let them be wary. It would make them vigilant.

*

He spends much of his time at the keep in Montsimmard, where he spends many of his days helping with maintenance and repairs. The little he had helped with the reconstruction of Gwaren is of some use, and the rest mostly requires brute strength and the ability to follow instruction, both of which Loghain has in spades. Sometimes they send him out on patrols, if there’s scattered group of darkspawn seen encroaching on their territory, if there is a suitable group of Wardens available that can stand his company.

They never send him out on recruitment drives, however. Loghain might be able to recognize the skill of a man, but he has no talent for convincing one to fight beside him. Not when his reputation is in tatters, not when he doesn’t have an army at his disposal, not when he is simply another soldier. Loghain is good at what he does, one of the best, but _speeches_ had never been his strong suit. He would leave them to those with more political inclinations than he.

He'd made such a mess of it all the one time he had tried alone, realized his folly too late, should have trusted his daughter more. Saw too much of the little girl she’d once been, braided hair and skinned knees, that it overpowered the woman she’d become. A skilled politician. A queen. He never should have given so much credence to the advice of the likes of Howe, should have noticed the man’s ulterior motives sooner, should have been less naïve.

The work here might be monotonous, but it is honest, and that is all he can ask for.

He thought he would have hated it here, but he finds he does not mind it. It has given him a strange sort of closure, to be away from his home, to be away from the source of so many of his terrible memories.

Here, he can rebuild.

*

It is late at night during one of his patrols that he is struck by just how ordinary everything is. If it was not for the innkeeper’s accent, he could be in any tavern in Ferelden, if not Thedas. The common folk carry with them a nervous energy Loghain has not seen since the early days of the civil war back in Ferelden. There has been much upheaval in these past few months, with the mage rebellion and the tensions brewing between the royals and nobles in Orlais. If Loghain had been unable to keep up with the alliances and machinations that had constituted the court back at Ferelden, he is completely lost when it comes to the Game the Orlesians like to play.

He is no longer a player, and for that, he is grateful. Ferelden is in Anora’s hands, but she does not need his counsel.

She needs her father.

Loghain has never been a prolific letter-writer, but for Anora, he tries; anything that he now knows of the situation in Ferelden is through his daughter, of what has piqued her interest. There is much of it, of course; Anora has always been a particularly shrewd person, but Loghain does not have to do anything about it now, simply has to listen. Respond. Tell her some tales about his own life, letting her know that he is safe. That he is healthy.

There is a simple joy in being able to focus on the simple things.

He is lucky to be alive.

He _understands_.

*

The sky has been torn asunder and his brothers have gone mad. In the last few months, Loghain’s easy peace has been shattered by arguments and fighting and disagreements over blood magic, a song played to a familiar tune. He is not immune to the fake calling (for that is what it must be, a fabrication), and that too is an old song, one which he can still hum although he has long forgotten the words. He cannot get the refrain out of his head, hates it, but he’s not ready to march to his death. Not now.

The whole damned world as he knows it needs saving.

He reads and rereads the letter in his hands.

_Warden Loghain,  
I fear we might have much in common. We both fought at the battle at Ostagar. We both know a thing or two about making hard decisions, of being made pariahs. _

_We both wish to know more about Corypheus._

_Should this be of interest to you, please express your interest to my associate, and she will send your wishes onto me.  
\- Hawke. _

He had of course heard about the events in Kirkwall, even if he had not gone out of his way to seek out information about it. And Hawke was right.

They _did_ have a lot in common.

*

He has lived a long life, filled with many incredible things, but he had never thought he would physically walk in the Fade itself. Had never even considered such a feat possible, let alone desirable. Who would want to consort with demons, apart from the truly desperate?

_The truly desperate._ That’s how they had ended up in this mess, had they not? Loghain had always been a pragmatist, had always believed that the ends justified the means, but this is where he drew the line, this is what he could not condone. There had to be another way, didn’t there?

The demon that calls itself the Nightmare bears down upon them, uttering their deepest fear in front of them all. The joke’s on the demon, though, because Loghain has made no secret of his failings ever since the monumental mess he had made of the Fereldan civil war. It’s as he tells the creature: there's nothing it can say that he already hasn't told himself.

When the time comes, when they need a distraction, it seems natural for Loghain to volunteer. But when Hawke and the Inquisitor turn to look at him, that the decision has been made for him.

He needs to live.

*

It is through the Inquisitor’s good graces that the Wardens are not banished from Orlais, and as the senior surviving warden it falls upon Loghain to travel to Weisshaupt and submit his report.

Duty calls. He says his goodbyes. He trudges onwards.

He might still not be a religious man, but as he begins his long and arduous journey, he finds himself reflecting on words he had previously considered a mere platitude: _Maker watch over us all._


End file.
